A
anon_injz5i1vr2d6y
Guest
The good news is that my 79 year-old mom is pretty much out of the woods and on the tail end of recovering from COVID-19. I just wanted to share with you some details for awareness purposes.
Sunday, March 22: My brother calls me at 0600 from my parents house saying mom is in bad shape and "she looks like she's 100 years old". Zero energy, difficulty breathing, can't move at all and we found out she hadn't eaten since Friday. Brother calls ambulance because she's so weak that he fears moving him herself could injure her. She shows some symptoms of COVID-19, but no fever. In the hospital, they do a COVID-19 test, but will take days to get the result.
Thursday, March 26: I get a call from the hospital to pick her up. Her diagnosis is congestive heart failure which explains the weakness. No COVID-19 results yet, but they don't think she has it and they feel it's better for her (and probably them for bed space) to be at home. They give her oxygen and and a new medication to keep water from her heart. When they wheeled her out of the hospital, she still looked like she was in no shape to go home.
Friday, March 27: My 83 year-old dad calls me because he can't get my mom off the floor. By the time I got there he was able to get her in bed, but she looked really bad. My girlfriend and I help her back to the bathroom and I'm holding about 80% of her weight and she was only able to shuffle her feet about every six inches. I call my brother and he agrees to come over to help me take her back to the hospital. By the time he got there, she had recovered enough that we wanted to wait it out a bit. Give her a chance to take her medication, eat/drink something...
Saturday/Sunday: Over the course of the weekend, she slowly recovers enough that she can get to the bathroom with minimal help. She's pretty much out of the woods. Thankfully!
Monday, March 30: We get a call from her doctor - she tested positive for COVID-19. Now, my brother, sister-in-law, myself, and my girlfriend all have to self-quarantine for 14 days. None of us are currently symptomatic. Yay us!
What I want you to take from this is that I've seen people focusing on fever as being the "indicator" of COVID-19. My mom never had a fever. Her symptoms were: loss of appetite, complete weakness and difficulty breathing. And, seeing her laid up in bed looking like she aged 30 years in two weeks was heartbreaking. My siblings and I were expecting the worst, that's how bad she looked. I know many on the board are taking this seriously... and for those of you who aren't, I really hope nobody you know or love ever has to go through what my mom did this past week. It was absolutely brutal.
Stay safe!
Sunday, March 22: My brother calls me at 0600 from my parents house saying mom is in bad shape and "she looks like she's 100 years old". Zero energy, difficulty breathing, can't move at all and we found out she hadn't eaten since Friday. Brother calls ambulance because she's so weak that he fears moving him herself could injure her. She shows some symptoms of COVID-19, but no fever. In the hospital, they do a COVID-19 test, but will take days to get the result.
Thursday, March 26: I get a call from the hospital to pick her up. Her diagnosis is congestive heart failure which explains the weakness. No COVID-19 results yet, but they don't think she has it and they feel it's better for her (and probably them for bed space) to be at home. They give her oxygen and and a new medication to keep water from her heart. When they wheeled her out of the hospital, she still looked like she was in no shape to go home.
Friday, March 27: My 83 year-old dad calls me because he can't get my mom off the floor. By the time I got there he was able to get her in bed, but she looked really bad. My girlfriend and I help her back to the bathroom and I'm holding about 80% of her weight and she was only able to shuffle her feet about every six inches. I call my brother and he agrees to come over to help me take her back to the hospital. By the time he got there, she had recovered enough that we wanted to wait it out a bit. Give her a chance to take her medication, eat/drink something...
Saturday/Sunday: Over the course of the weekend, she slowly recovers enough that she can get to the bathroom with minimal help. She's pretty much out of the woods. Thankfully!
Monday, March 30: We get a call from her doctor - she tested positive for COVID-19. Now, my brother, sister-in-law, myself, and my girlfriend all have to self-quarantine for 14 days. None of us are currently symptomatic. Yay us!
What I want you to take from this is that I've seen people focusing on fever as being the "indicator" of COVID-19. My mom never had a fever. Her symptoms were: loss of appetite, complete weakness and difficulty breathing. And, seeing her laid up in bed looking like she aged 30 years in two weeks was heartbreaking. My siblings and I were expecting the worst, that's how bad she looked. I know many on the board are taking this seriously... and for those of you who aren't, I really hope nobody you know or love ever has to go through what my mom did this past week. It was absolutely brutal.
Stay safe!
